David Boyle

La segunda mitad del siglo XVIII significó una auténtica Edad de Oro en la historia de Escocia. Los ideales humanistas y racionalistas de la Ilustración francesa prendieron con extraordinaria fuerza en la Ilustración escocesa, que, imbuida de optimismo en el ser humano y en su capacidad de mejora, se orientó a la aplicación práctica de las ideas y al progreso social. Escocia se colocaba así a la cabeza de Europa, convertida en uno de los más destacados focos comerciales, económicos y culturales del continente. En este fenómeno, desarrollado fundamentalmente en las ciudades de Glasgow y Edimburgo, resultó determinante la contribución de los ingenieros escoceses. Sus numerosos inventos e innovaciones en todos los campos de la actividad humana, entre los que se cuenta la máquina de vapor de James Watt, propiciaron el nacimiento de la Revolución industrial, y con ella, la radical transformación socioeconómica y tecnológica de las sociedades modernas. El prestigioso escritor y periodista británico David Boyle recrea con ameno estilo e infinidad de detalles este trascendental capítulo de la historia del pueblo escocés, haciendo desfilar a sus principales pensadores, descubridores, científicos e inventores, y detallando las pioneras propuestas técnicas de sus más brillantes ingenieros a lo largo de los tres últimos siglos. Una obra de gran interés histórico, que permite conocer el papel protagonista desempeñado por Escocia y su innovadora ingeniería en la evolución de Europa y del mundo. La obra incluye un extraordinario repertorio de ilustraciones, fotografías y mapas que permiten al lector recrear un vivaz fresco de época.

Novecientas fotografías comentadas. Imágenes de todos los escenarios bélicos. Con un índice pormenorizado y claras explicaciones históricas. Ofrece un examen de las causas y consecuencias de la guerr

La Segunda Guerra Mundial en Imágenes presenta 900 fotografías de gran calidad seleccionadas a partir de una enorme variedad de fuentes. Todos los grandes escenarios del conflicto aparecen aquí representados, desde los helados mares del Artico hasta las junglas del sur del Pacifico, de los desiertos del norte de Africa a las estepas de Rusia.

Only our limited idea of money is keeping us poor. David Boyle introduces us to alternative cash and people who can conjure money that is, spending power out of nothing. Until recently, the growth of alternative cash had been the province of big business: phone cards, stamps, air miles and Tescos clubcard points all have purchasing power, yet are not cash as we know it. Now, locally created money systems like time dollars, Womanshare and Ithaca hours are being invented by communities for communities. With clarity and great humour, Boyle tells the story of this extraordinary revolution: he travels to the USA to visit the people behind local money systems; relates their vision of the future; and describes how to set up your own currency. This is no dry theoretical tome: Boyle writes about his subject in a way that is concrete, illuminating, often very funny and always highly readable. This paperback edition includes a new epilogue with an update on the latest alternative currency ideas: You just have to cast doubt on the real existence of the money markets and they could just shrivel away. Anything could happen. A revolution is underway now: this book tells the story of its leaders and the ideas that inspired them.

* ¿En qué punto nos encontraríamos si no existiesen la rueda o el vidrio? Imagine la vida sin el cemento o los ordenadores. * Piense durante un momento cómo mejoran nuestra salud y nuestro bienestar las vacunas y el marcapasos. * En este libro descubrira 50 inventos revolucionarios que han cambiado el mundo en campos como el de los materiales, la medicina, la ingenieria, la energia, los transportes o las pantallas tactiles, asi como a las personas responsables de esas ideas.Se repasa la historia del progreso humano a traves del trabajo de autenticos genios: desde el descubrimiento fortuito de la fabricacion de vidrio tras calentar arena hasta el "momento eureka" que nos permite iluminar el mundo con solo accionar un interruptor.Las entradas, breves y entretenidas, acompañadas de su imagen correspondiente, proporcionan la via mas rapida para entender los avances tecnologicos y sociales mas destacados.

The word tickbox emerged recently as a cynical angle on official or corporate incompetence. They had ticked the box - people said - but failed to act. It is increasingly used to describe this gap between official spin and reality.Yet, says David Boyle in this powerful expose of tickbox culture, that is just the tip of a vast tickbox iceberg. The only people who remain blind to this gap are those rich or powerful enough to run the world, and behind Tickbox lies an insidious philosophy of automation and the misuse of data that weighs heavily on every one of us. It makes our public services less effective - and makes them soar in costs - it lies behind so many stark injustices and disasters, from Grenfell Tower to the deportation of the Windrush generation. Yet the system carries on, and grows in power and strengths - vacuuming up the resources of the NHS pursuing pointless targets or badgering us to reveal how much we had enjoyed our visit to their bank counter - because those who run the world remain committed to it.It is time we escaped the tentacles of Tickbox. Boyle suggests a series of ways out - starting with recognising the danger and calling it out for what it is - a massive failure, corroding our lives and our ability, as human beings, to act on the world.

English culture is confused, muddled and often borrowed. The purpose of this book is to give the reader a complete grounding in the idiosyncrasies of the English and to pin down the absurdities and warmth of Englishness at its best.Featured in this book are such established English cultural behemoths as the Beatles, Big Ben and the Last Night of the Proms alongside less celebrated quirks such as meat pies and the working mans haven, the allotment. Here we celebrate the bell-ringers and Morris dancers, bowler hats (the symbol of respectable Englishness) and cardigans (symbol of staid middle-class solidarity). We examine the brutality of Punch and Judy and our historic love of fairies, once so much a part of the English psyche that they were described as the British religion.At once fond and irreverent, laudatory and curious, How to Be English might just teach us how to be English once again.

On his way back from the crusades, one of Englands most famous and romantic medieval kings was ship-wrecked and stranded near Venice. Trying to make his way home in disguise, he was arrested and imprisoned and effectively disappeared. He didnt return home for another fifteen months, and at enormous cost - a quarter of the entire wealth of England was paid to win his release.The extraordinary events surrounding Richard the Lionhearts disappearance provides the background to some of the most colourful and enduring legends - Robin Hood, the Sheriff of Nottingham, the discovery of King Arthurs grave, and above all, the story of Blondel, Richards faithful minstrel, and his journey across central Europe - singing under castle towers - until he finds the missing king.Blondels Song tells the tale of one of the most peculiar incidents of medieval history, and the background to the real Blondel and his fellow troubadours, as well as the courts of love, the Holy Grail, emergence of gothic cathedrals like Notre Dame and Chartres, and the unique moment of tolerance in the West - when Europe shared a language, and a new culture of music, romance and chivalry.

Never before have we attempted to measure as much as we do today. Why are we so obsessed with numbers? What can they really tell us?Too often we try to quantify what cant actually be measured. We count people, but not individuals. We count exam results rather than intelligence, benefit claimants instead of poverty. The government has set itself 10,000 new targets. Politicians pack their speeches with skewed statistics: crime rates are either rising or falling depending on who is doing the counting.We are in a world in which everything designed only to be measured. If it cant be measured it can be ignored.But the big problem is what numbers dont tell you. They wont interpret. They wont inspire, and they wont tell you precisely what causes what.In this passionately argued and thought-provoking book, David Boyle examines our obsession with numbers. He reminds us of the danger of taking numbers so seriously at the expense of what is non-measurable, non-calculable: intuition, creativity, imagination, happinessCounting is a vital human skill. Yardsticks are a vital tool. As long as we remember how limiting they are if we cling to them too closely.Americans who claim to have been abducted by aliens = 3.7 millionAverage time spent by British people in traffic jams every year = 11 daysNumber of Americans shot by children under six between 1983 and 1993 = 138, 490

If you thought being middle-class meant your own home, something set aside for the kids and a comfortable retirement think again.For the first time ever, todays middle classes will struggle to enjoy the same privileges of security and comfort that their grandparents did. How did this situation come about? What can be done about it?In this beautifully shaped inquiry, David Boyle questions why the middle classes are diminishing and how their status, independence and values are being eroded. From Thatchers boost of the mortgage market to Blair and Browns posturing over public services, Broke examines the key moments in recent history that created the squeezed middle.Can the middle classes be revived? Should they be? Although they were not innocent in their downfall, Boyle argues that a newly galvanised middle class could be the key to future economic stability. The middle class may be broke, but it is not beyond repair.

* ¿En qué punto nos encontraríamos si no existiesen la rueda o el vidrio? Imagine la vida sin el cemento o los ordenadores. * Piense durante un momento cómo mejoran nuestra salud y nuestro bienestar las vacunas y el marcapasos. * En este libro descubrira 50 inventos revolucionarios que han cambiado el mundo en campos como el de los materiales, la medicina, la ingenieria, la energia, los transportes o las pantallas tactiles, asi como a las personas responsables de esas ideas. Se repasa la historia del progreso humano a traves del trabajo de autenticos genios: desde el descubrimiento fortuito de la fabricacion de vidrio tras calentar arena hasta el "momento eureka" que nos permite iluminar el mundo con solo accionar un interruptor. Las entradas, breves y entretenidas, acompañadas de su imagen correspondiente, proporcionan la via mas rapida para entender los avances tecnologicos y sociales mas destacados.

Considere la posibilidad de un mundo donde el oro no sirviese para nada, todo el mundo ganase la misma cantidad de dinero, los bancos no existiesen y el comercio internacional estuviese prohibido. ¿Seria nuestra vida mejor si todo trabajo fuese divertido, la deuda fuese liquilada y cualquiera pudiese vivir donde quisiera? ¿Que pasaria si se prohibiesen los anuncios, se paralizaran las compras y se racionasen los combustibles? Todas estas ideas y muchas mas son analizadas y debatidas en esta obra.Entre todas estas especulaciones, tambien hay espacio para siete ¿Que pasaria si...?, que examinan las consecuencias de experimentos economicos aplicados a la vida real, tales como ¿Que pasaria si se aboliese la esclavitud? y ¿Que pasaria si solo se imprimiesen billetes?.¿Que pasaria si el dinero creciese en arboles? le dara las claves necesarias para entender el funcionamiento del mundo financiero actual y para reflexionar acerca de la forma que podria adoptar este en el futuro.